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Ex-NCAA coach: I made up Manute Bol's birthday, might've been 40 in NBA

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Kevin Mackey, who recruited Manute Bol to his program at Cleveland State, claims he made up the late Sudanese icon's birthday when Bol arrived stateside in the mid-1980s.

“I gave him his birthday (Oct. 16, 1962) because they didn’t know how old he was," Mackey told Zagsblog's Adam Zagoria.

Beyond approximating Bol's actual date of birth, Mackey said he intentionally presented the ginormous 7-foot-7 center to be as young as plausible.

"Every athletic door is open at 19, every athletic door is closed when you’re 35," Mackey said, reasoning that it was in Bol's best interest to be viewed as a young prospect rather than a middle-aged adult. "He was probably 40, 50 years old when he was playing in the NBA."

Mackey claims immigration officials with partisan rooting interests in his program helped facilitate the botched birth certificate.

“The immigration people were in the office (at Cleveland State) and they thought it was great," Mackey explained. "They loved it. And they were big fans of Cleveland State, they used to come to all our games."

Bol never wound up playing for Cleveland State, instead becoming the first and only player from the Division II University of Bridgeport to make the leap to the NBA when the Washington Bullets selected him No. 31 in the 1985 draft. Over the next decade - what is considered to be Bol's age 23 through 32 seasons - the lanky center averaged 2.6 points, 4.2 rebounds, and a whopping 3.3 blocks per game.

With Bol passing away from kidney failure in 2010 (at age 47) and scant official documentation from his upbringing in war-torn and famine-ravaged Sudan, Mackey's account, particularly that Bol was as old as 50 while playing in the NBA, is difficult to verify.

Many players from Africa have long been hounded by similar rumors of dishonesty surrounding their age. Toronto Raptors big man Serge Ibaka, born in the Republic of the Congo, called out the media this summer for continuing to propagate questions surrounding the authenticity of his and other African-born players' announced age.

Unless someone with intimate knowledge of Bol's life comes forward - perhaps son Bol Bol, a top 2018 high school prospect who committed to Oregon earlier this week - it's unlikely basketball conspiracy theorists will ever truly know the entirety of Bol's biography.

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